Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Sorted by date Results 1 - 25 of 277
(JNS) - Nine people were killed and over two dozen wounded by an Iranian missile impact in Beit Shemesh on Sunday, according to Israel's Magen David Adom emergency medical service. According to Channel 12 News, a direct hit on a residential building caused the structure to collapse. Israel Police Jerusalem District Cmdr. Avshalom Peled told local media that the casualties were believed to have been inside a shelter when it took a direct hit from a ballistic missile. "We know from past incidents...
(JNS) — The U.S. embassy in Israel on Friday opened consular services for Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria for the first time. The one-day consular pop-up operation took place in Efrat, in the Gush Etzion region of Judea. An additional one is expected to open soon in Beitar Illit, in the Binyamin region of Samaria, according to the Yesha Council, an umbrella organization of Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria. Israel Ganz, head of the Binyamin Regional Council and chairman of the Yesha Council, described the move as “historic jus...
(JNS) — The Supreme Planning Council of the Israeli Defense Ministry’s Civil Administration on Thursday approved the construction of more than 1,300 housing units in the western Samaria community of Kedumim. The 1,338 homes in the planned Nahalat Esther neighborhood will more than double the size of Kedumim, which currently has some 4,850 residents living in around 1,050 households, Israel National News reported. The roughly 60-acre neighborhood will feature a green valley at its center. In total, the Kedumim Local Council is planning 3,000 hom...
(JNS) — The Israel Defense Forces killed several terrorists in separate incidents in the northern and southern Gaza Strip on Thursday, the military said. In the south, Israeli troops identified several armed terrorists who emerged from the underground terror infrastructure in eastern Rafah, in violation of the ceasefire agreement, the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit said in a statement on Friday. Shortly thereafter, “the troops alongside the Israeli Air Force struck and eliminated some of the terrorists in order to remove the threat,” the IDF said. I...
(JNS) - The Israel Defense Forces military campaign, "Operation Roaring Lion," against the Islamic Republic of Iran will continue "until we achieve all our objectives," IDF Spokesperson Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin told reporters on Saturday night. "We went to war-to this operation-to remove a real, existential threat to the State of Israel," he stated at the press briefing, adding: "It will take as long as it takes; it will continue until we achieve all our objectives." Asked by local media how...
(JNS) — Israeli Air Force jets have flown hundreds of sorties since achieving air superiority over Tehran, the Israel Defense Forces said on Monday morning. “The air force continues to strike across Iran and neutralize [missile] launchers,” the Israel Defense Forces stated on X, sharing footage of fighter jets returning after attacking targets in the Islamic Republic. On Sunday night, the IDF announced that it carried out more than 700 sorties after the IAF “cleared the way to Tehran” within 24 hours of the start of “Operation Roaring Lio...
(JNS) - Gumbo and Bandit, the dogs of U.S. Ambassador Mike Huckabee and his wife, dressed up ahead of the Jewish holiday of Purim, which was last week. In a video published on the U.S. ambassador's social media accounts on Thursday, Mike and Janet Huckabee dressed Gumbo and Bandit in the Israeli and American flag, respectively, as well as blue and red hats. "Two thousand three hundred years ago, God orchestrated through Queen Esther and Mordechai the salvation of the Jewish people and victory...
(JNS) — Nearly 15 hours after Jessica Tisch, the New York City Police Department commissioner, decried attacks on police officers in Washington Square Park, Mayor Zohran Mamdani said that it was just "kids throwing snowballs." "The NYPD is aware of certain videos taken earlier today in Washington Square Park showing individuals attacking cops. I want to be very clear: The behavior depicted is disgraceful, and it is criminal," Tisch stated at 9:55 p.m. on Monday. "Our detectives are investigating this matter." At 11:46 a.m. on Tuesday, M...
(JNS) — Holocaust survivor Charlotte Roth, 96, finalized her immigration to Israel on Wednesday in Tel Aviv, nearly eight decades after being liberated from Nazi captivity. Roth, born in Czechoslovakia, survived Auschwitz and a death march after being deported with her family in 1944. She later rebuilt her life in a Displaced Persons camp, married and immigrated to the United States before raising four children in Cleveland, Ohio. Accompanied by five generations of descendants, Roth completed her immigration process with the help of Nefesh B...
(JNS) — A senior Cabinet minister in Germany who was the main government representative at the Berlin International Film Festival, aka the Berlinale, on Sunday, left the event in protest after a director accused Israel of perpetrating genocide. Carsten Schneider, the federal minister for the environment, nature conservation, climate protection and nuclear safety, represents the center-left Social Democratic Party. He left the Berlinale gala event during a speech by Syrian filmmaker Abdallah Alkhatib, who identifies as a Palestinian, the dpa n...
(JNS) — The population of Israeli villages along the southern border has grown by 3,000 residents since Oct. 7, 2023, even as five communities are still waiting to return home, a Knesset committee was told on Monday. Aviad Friedman, head of the Tekuma Authority that is responsible for rebuilding the Gaza border towns destroyed in the Hamas-led Oct. 7 massacre, described the population growth as “an exciting Zionist event” during a hearing at the Knesset State Control Committee. “The number of residents in the region has grown from some 62,000...
(JNS) — U.S. Vice President JD Vance said on Tuesday that President Donald Trump has “a lot tools” to ensure that the Iranian regime doesn’t acquire nuclear weapons amid indirect talks between Washington and Tehran and an American military buildup in the Middle East. The vice president spoke to Fox News on the day that a second round of U.S.-Iran negotiations in Geneva took place, with the Iranians signaling progress. Vance said that Washington has set red lines in nuclear negotiations with Iran and that Trump retains military options if dipl...
(JNS) — Over 1,400 bereaved families gathered last week to plant trees in memory of their loved ones at the newly established Iron Swords Forest, which spans 367 dunams (approximately 90 acres). Established last October by Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael–Jewish National Fund at Khirbet Mador, near the Re’im Recreation Area, the forest is Israel’s largest memorial dedicated to those murdered and the fallen in the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, massacre and the ensuing war. Among the participants was Vered Libstein of Kibbutz Kfar Aza, who lost four family...
(JNS) — The Hostages and Missing Families Forum announced Feb. 9 that it was officially terminating its operations in light of the return from Gaza of the last deceased hostage, Master Sgt. Ran Gvili. The body of the 24-year-old volunteer in the elite Israel Police Yasam Special Patrol Unit was held in the Strip for 843 days before it was brought back for burial in Israel, closing the chapter on the 251 individuals abducted into Gaza during the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre, and four others taken before the war. The Israeli NGO said it had ...
(JNS) — Israel is allocating tens of millions of shekels to a newly-created “Hills Administration” that will seek to combat anti-Arab violence in Judea and Samaria by some 300 Jewish rioters, Ynet reported on Sunday. The initiative, which is being promoted by Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz and was first reported in November, calls for the creation of a new unit within the Israeli Defense Ministry to coordinate a response for at-risk youth. Under the plan, the Defense Ministry would receive two million shekels (about $500,000) annua...
(JNS) — The Israeli Cabinet on Sunday approved a series of measures aimed at deepening Jerusalem’s hold on Judea and Samaria and expanding Jewish communities in the region, according to Hebrew-language media. The decisions promoted by Defense Minister Israel Katz and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich are reportedly expected to bring about far-reaching changes to land acquisition rules in Judea and Samaria. The approved measures include lifting confidentiality from land registry records; canceling historic restrictions on land sales to non...
(JNS) — The Israel Defense Forces and the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) apprehended more than 20 Palestinian terrorists and wanted individuals overnight Sunday in counter-terrorism operations across Judea and Samaria. The IDF Samaria Brigade arrested a terrorist involved in the purchase and possession of weapons, as well as in planning to harm Israeli soldiers and civilians, the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit said. Four more suspects were detained during the operation in the area. In a separate operation, IDF troops and Border Police fighters app...
(JNS) — Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urged his nation to unify as the United States has been boosting its military presence in the Gulf region. “The enemy must be driven to despair. The enemy’s despair comes through [our] unity, strength of thought and determination, and steadfastness in confronting the enemy’s temptations. These are what build national power,” Khamenei tweeted. AFP cited the Iranian leader as calling on his citizens to show resolve ahead of the 47th anniversary this week of the Islamic Revolution that brough...
(JNS) — The Israeli currency surged to one of its strongest levels in decades, trading at 3.09 shekels per dollar at noon on Thursday. A similar exchange rate was last recorded in November 2021 and in 1996. The Bank of Israel’s representatives exchange rates set on Wednesday afternoon included 3.0910 per U.S. dollar, 4.2609 per British pound, 2.2798 per Canadian dollar, 2.1657 per Australian dollar and 3.7039 per euro. The shekel’s strengthening is not a momentary outlier, as it has been rising against the nominal effective exchange rate...
(JNS) — Lebanon’s prime minister vowed on Tuesday to keep his country out of war after Hezbollah’s leader last week warned that a strike on Iran would be an attack on its Lebanese terror proxy. “We will never allow anyone to drag the country into another adventure,” AFP quoted Nawaf Salam as saying during the World Governments Summit in Dubai, in response to a question about comments made by Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Qassem. Hassan Nasrallah’s replacement said on Jan. 26 that his Lebanese Shi’ite terror army and its main backer in Teh...
(JNS) — Israel’s Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism Minister Amichai Chikli lashed out on Sunday at Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, calling him a “dictator,” “Hamas sympathizer” and “promoter of Sharia-based authoritarianism.” Chikli referenced a short video clip posted on social media in which Erdoğan apparently spoke recently in Turkish about the need of the region’s peoples to unite on the “common ground of Islamic brotherhood.” It is unclear whether the Turkish leader was referring to the Muslim Brotherhood group, whos...
(JNS) — In recent years, the number of Jews in New York applying for German citizenship has nearly doubled, according to a Deutsche Welle report. That includes Ruth Gruenthal, who fled Nazi persecution in her teens and rebuilt her life in the United States. The 103-year-old told the German publication that U.S. President Donald Trump’s reelection “evoked feelings that I thought I would never in my lifetime have to deal with again.” The German consulate in New York City has recorded 666 restorations of naturalizations of Jews, whose citizen...
(JNS) - Israeli President Isaac Herzog on Wednesday received the diplomatic credentials of the new ambassadors of Fiji and Thailand to Israel in formal ceremonies at the President's Residence in Jerusalem. Welcoming Fiji's envoy, Jesoni Vitusagavulu, Herzog said, "I am honored to welcome the first-ever ambassador of Fiji to Israel in Jerusalem." Herzog congratulated the Pacific island nation on its decision to open an embassy in Jerusalem, calling it a historic milestone in bilateral relations....
(JNS) — In an E.U. survey published on Tuesday, 69% of some 25,000 respondents said that events in Israel shape how Jews are perceived in their country. The poll, published on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, showed an increase in the perception that Israel influences how Jews are thought of: In a similar poll from 2018, 54 percent indicated there was a link to the Jewish state. The European Commission’s Eurobarometer survey on the perception of antisemitism also reported that 55 percent of respondents consider antisemitism to be a pro...
(JNS) - A Jewish morning prayer took place on Thursday at Joseph's Tomb in Samaria, for the first time in 25 years. The shrine, which is venerated by Jews, Samaritans, Christians and Muslims, has a decades-long history of violence. Since the outbreak of the Second Intifada, entry to the complex on the southeastern outskirts of Nablus was permitted only at nighttime, under heavy security. Hundreds of worshippers, including Religious Zionism lawmaker Zvi Sukkot and Samaria Regional Council head Yo...
